


Through a Glass, Darkly

by KuriKoer



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Aftermath, Gen, Payback, the concept of torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-30
Updated: 2012-10-30
Packaged: 2017-11-17 09:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/549934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KuriKoer/pseuds/KuriKoer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Afterwards.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through a Glass, Darkly

They didn't break him.

They reduced him to a whimpering mess, they deciphered every single one of his weaknesses and threw each one in his face, but they did not break him. Loki writhed on the concrete floor and then curled around himself, metaphorically licking his wounds - letting the literal ones go untended - but he comforted himself in the knowledge that there was a core to him that they'd never touched.

He could've known the Hawk would want revenge. Barton was silent, efficient brutality where Romanova took sharp, quiet pleasure in words, twisting them into him in a way that made him yearn for her steel stilettos, for anything but her knowing look. But she was there for Barton, Loki knew, lending her skill in his service, a favour, or a debt repaid. She was there because as a team, they had a hope of getting Loki back for what he'd done. To Barton, at least.

The woman spoke to him, calmly and mercilessly, while her silent partner worked him over, and over, invasive, knowledgeable, making up in abundance for the fact he could not inflict more than tolerable pain on the aesir flesh. Loki had suffered greater wounds, but possibly not greater humility. Barton's claws were hooked in his mind more than in his flesh. He bled on the floor, saw the dark red drops soaking into dusty concrete, but what had hurt was that they had seen him squirm.

They were mortals. He was a _king_. He was a god. Loki bit his lips to avoid screaming but it only held for so long before he couldn't, before the noise spilled, and with it his admittance. They had bested him, somehow. They had taken from him some things which no man should ever abandon. Loki knew he had taken the same from Barton and still... It was not the same.

It was worse.

And still he held on to his tattered self with bleeding, shaking fingers, and he would not let go. Not of the truth. That was the one grain deep inside that Romanova could not pry out for Barton to methodically twist and destroy. The real reason Loki's core stayed cold and true and untouched. Because no matter how hot, how forged Barton's hatred was, Romanova's contempt, they could not by far match Loki's own towards the reflection he saw in their eyes.


End file.
